Buddy Jones: New Season, Focused Schedule, New Goals

Monday, March 4, 2013

New Season, Focused Schedule, New Goals

By Buddy Jones

Training has begun for 2013 and Southern California has been cold! Yes, living here, I am spoiled. When it hits 30 degrees, I dress like I am running in 0 degree weather. It also makes it hard to get out of my nice warm bed and hit the trails. My motivation though are the beautiful sunrises, gorgeous green rolling hills, and my season goals.

I think the biggest factor to success in anything I have done in the past has been to set clear and concise goals for what I wanted to do. To merely have a training program or plan is simply not enough. You need to know where you want that training program to take you. This year I have done things a little differently in my goal setting and season preparation.

For 2013 I have planned out my entire year of racing and will do my best to stick to it. Last year, I planned it out and did not even try to stick to it. I was racing when I should have been recovering and recovering when I should have been racing. It lead to me getting run down, sick, and injured. So, this year my season will be a "step-up" in distance. I have the mileage base, and will work on speed for the start of the season.

My first race will be a 10K snowshoe race. From there, hilly 10 mile and 20 mile trail races in March. April, I will bump up my training mileage yet keep my race distance to a trail half-marathon. May, I hit my first long race of 24-hours. From there I will pull back slightly on my training mileage and my race distances will drop back down to a 50K and another trail half-marathon in the month of June. From there I build in training mileage and maintain the 50Kdistance races in July and August. September brings on my first "goal race" of the year. The inaugural Kodiak 100 mile. This is the race where I want to place at minimum on the podium. The end of September through October will be a time for fun and recovery. My last race of the year will be another 100 miler in mid-November.

While that schedule looks busy, you will notice breaks in there and even the word "fun". The biggest part of training and goal setting is making it fun. That's the reason we all get into this sport!

My advice to anyone running, is to set clear and concise goals on what you want to do. People ask me all the time what keeps me motivated and the answer is always the same. I have goals I want to obtain and I have a blast going for them. So what is your goal? Set that goal, then put together a clear plan on how and when you will achieve that goal. Then go for it and have FUN!